Page 136 of A Prime's Passion (The Pretern Wars 1)

Chapter Forty-Two

Zee stared out thewindow of the room she’d been given when she came to the Big House just a handful of days ago.

Days.

It just had been a couple of days.

How had her life changed so much in just days?

Except it was like her life always seemed to turn on its head like that. When she was a teenager, in the blink of an eye, her whole world had shifted the day her father told her she was being sent to Durham-Starfell for school—meritorious scholarship from Appalachia’s leadership, he’d told her.

Later, she learned Phoenix had filed the paperwork for the grants she’d received, desperate to get her out of Greylock.

The day she laid eyes on Niko, her world had flipped again.

The day he turned on her, once more, she was sent spinning.

Not even a week had passed since Colby showed up at The Mermaid’s Tale with news about her father. It had taken seconds, only seconds.

Now she was here again, perched on a precipice. In seconds, her life could change.

Arms crossed over her chest, she stared at the loose gathering of Therians prowling the grounds. Some wore their human skins, others walked on four feet, ears pricked and eyes alert.

From time to time, one would trot over to Boone who stood sentry in front of the old well house. The well had been closed up decades earlier as technology changed and improved, but the building remained, its foundations sturdy and strong.

On the rare occasion there was a need to incarcerate somebody on pack lands, the well house made a fine prison.

Brandon’s corpse had been brought back to the Big House, along with Terrence Ball’s unconscious form. Ball’s dead allies had been collected and dumped on the road just beyond Appalachia’s territorial borders, a call placed to law enforcement in Durham-Starfell.

Tension was a weight in the pack.

Therian instincts were keen. Some theorized those instincts were on par with the psychic skills some humans had. It wasn’t outside the realm of possibility. Although nobody had mentioned why a human male had been dumped unceremoniously on the hard stone floors of the well house, or why the second in command stood sentry at the door, the pack had gathered, more and more appearing as the awareness spread across their numbers.

From time to time, one of them would shoot a look in her direction.

Thattension, she understood.

Her scent was all over Ball, the scent of her, her wolf, and the magic that came from the part of her that was Leanan Sidhé.

She knew she wasn’t the only one who picked up the odd scent she’d forever associate with Fae magic—something that hinted at the forest deep at night, of lavender left to dry, of the air just before a summer storm broke. Even now, it clung to her skin, despite the long shower she’d taken after returning to the house.

The wolves would pick up on that scent as easily as she had. She couldn’t blame them for being curious. She even understood the wariness she sensed from some of them.

But the animosity coloring the air...

She swallowed the growl trying to rumble out of her.

She would make this her home. Niko was her mate and his pack would become hers.

It would take time for her to really fit here.

But damned if she wasn’t tired of being judged by those who had no business judging her.

The necklace Meridia had given her hung between her breasts, the beaten gold glinting dully against a lace-edged blouse of rich umber. She stroked a finger over it, remembering Meridia’s words.

You’re like a willow... you bend. You don’t break.

She’d come so close to breaking though. Come so close to letting fear, shame and loneliness control her. Anger bit at her now, thinking of the wounded girl who’d stared back at her when she looked in the mirror, so afraid to even reach out for fear of another blow. She’d locked herself down, locked herself in.

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